@doowles

A suggestion: Do what I did (2 years ago) and get a cheap SSD drive for your laptop/desktop, then install MINT Mate on it and play with it. You can swap back to Win7 easily as part of this no-risk procedure. When I say 'play with it', I mean 'kick the s**t out of it'. You can do what you like to it and do a fresh install as often as you like (no license keys or internet activation procedure). You can massage it in many ways to make it look like how you want it to look. There will be swearing; this phase will pass.

When you've got it singing and dancing as you want it, just clone your hard drive and you can then restore it in case of disaster (no annoying checking to see if you've changed the hard drive or the motherboard). There are more clever and more subtle ways of backing up your 'system' but I use whole partition cloning since I'm a fan of big boots and big stick methods. (You'll keep your personal data on a separate partition of course.)

If you don't like MATE, try Cinnamon or KDE or XFCE or LXDE (lovely on old hardware). They're just Desktop Environment interface layers though they do come with their own ecosystem of colour coordinated and matching accessories. You install them from the one-stop-shop which is the Software Manager which also takes care of internally 'registering' them and managing dependencies.

If you get stuck or confused, there are many forums and a quick Google search will usually find a posting or article of use to you. Go on, give it a try. The most you'll loose is some time and some sanity but you will have a spare SSD drive at the end of it all if it turns out to be not suitable for you.

I've had a look at Windows 10 using the Technical Preview release ISO which is free if you 'sign up' with an email address. It looks like a magazine for teenagers and has some aspects that are confusing for me regarding how you arrange the desktop and get shortcuts to work. I'll admit that I tried to make it look like XP so I'm sure I'll be happy to continue using Linux MINT (Mate) which is very easy to make look like XP at the desktop GUI level.

Re: Spelling

'Metre', 'litre', and so on are French words that we've 'borrowed from the neighbours' and are looking after them, in case the French lose them at some time in the future. If you borrow things, you don't make alterations to them.

Nooooo!

"I now take bread with me on site," he told us.

That was how it started, with the guy who worked there before you throwing a few crumbs at them. Whoever replaces you will need to bring fish sandwiches. After four generations, they'll expect a full sit-down dinner.

Just wondering

"As Senator Tillis highlighted today in his legislation, the City of Wilson ... only made a profit of $720,000 in 2013, having lost nearly $7m over the previous five years of operation."

Was that an actual operating loss of $1.4m a year for five years, suddenly followed by an operating profit of $720k; or did it take them five years to payback the initial capital investment? Ah, the political numbers game.

Re: Won't fix

Oh dear

"The NCA is advising people to check whether their computer has been infected by downloading specialist disinfection software, which is available free of charge at CyberStreetWise or GetSafeOnline."

The police want me to download some software and run it on my computer. How do I know this isn't some backdoor to enable the police or the government or GCHQ to spy on me? There is no more trust; they lost mine a long time ago.

re. 'Casio' and 'Pure' items

I'd imagine that Casio and Pure are not exactly happy about their good names being used in this way. However, I believe that as long as the customer is made aware of the true nature of the equipment (which they obviously will be), then Casio and Pure etc. can't do anything about it.

@P.Lee Re: Fuck ads and all who serve them up

@Iain Thomson

" ... It'll be sad to let go of my laptop when it reaches end of life, ..."

My ten year old Acer Travelmate 8000 (15" 4:3 matte screen) was very much revitalised by an SSD drive with Linux (Mint) installed on it. It's now the computer (out of four that I have) that gets the most use. I'd recommend it, give it a try.

It's good, yes

Photoshop Elements was bundled onto a Windows 7 laptop that I bought about four years ago. I think it would have cost about £50 if bought separately at the time. I remember that the photo catalogue and workflow tools seemed to be very simple to use and effective and would have been a good reason to have it. Before that, I used to use an old copy of Paint Shop Pro; before Corel bought it and ruined it.

Now, I use GIMP because it's free and does everything I need it for, in my techie-hobbyist way.

Re: Dark secrets in Cupertino...

Re: Thin line

I've often considered setting up a simple spelling-n-grammar correction service. Along the lines of "Send me your specialist e-mail or document, with a Bitcoin payment. I'll correct your spelling and grammar then send it back to you." P.S. Advice to scammers: don't start your e-mail with 'My Dear'.